Darwin’s Doubt is an intriguing exploration of one of the most remarkable periods in the evolutionary history of life -- the rapid efflorescence of complex body plans written in the fossils of the Burgess Shale. In laying out his case for intelligent design (ID) based on this evidence, Meyer has emerged from the “ID wars” of the past decade as perhaps the most thoughtful and engaging advocate of this controversial perspective. No matter what convictions or beliefs one holds about evolution, Darwinism or intelligent design, Darwin’s Doubt is a book that should be read, engaged and discussed.

How about more praise for Meyer's book? Dr. Russell Carlson, professor of biochemistry and molecular biology, director of the Complex Carbohydrate Research Center, at the University of Georgia:

Stephen Meyer elegantly explains why the sudden appearance of animal forms in the Cambrian period gave Darwin pause. He also demonstrates, based on cutting-edge molecular biology, why explaining the origin of animals is now not just a problem of missing fossils, but an even greater engineering problem at the molecular level. With mathematical precision, he shows why the neo-Darwinian mechanism cannot produce the genetic information and novel proteins -- or systems for regulating their expression -- that are required to build new animals. An excellent book and a must read for anyone who wants to gain understanding of the very real -- though often unreported -- scientific challenges facing neo-Darwinism.

Let's take a step back from the excitement surrounding the publication today of Stephen Meyer's new book, Darwin's Doubt: The Explosive Origin of Animal Life and the Case for Intelligent Design, and recall the origins of the book. Well, you know by now that they go back to Steve Meyer's PhD studies at Cambridge University and before that to the discovery of the Burgess Shale in 1909 by Smithsonian Institution paleontologist Charles Doolittle Walcott -- and to Charles Darwin's own doubts about whether the Cambrian explosion, 530 million years ago, could be reconciled with his new theory.

Less familiar to many of us may be that Dr. Meyer first raised some (but far from all) of the scientific challenges that you'll find in the new book in a 2004 technical article published in a peer-reviewed biology journal, the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington. The journal was edited by a Smithsonian Institution evolutionary biologist, Richard Sternberg, affiliated with the National Museum of Natural History.